MUIDS Skills for Life Self-Directed Project

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Learning Outcomes:

To create a self-directed project which demonstrates your development of conceptual

and / or procedural knowledge

To create a plan for learning which helps you to reach your desired outcomes

To document and reflect on your learning process and attainment of the learning
outcomes

Learners: Individual learners will complete the following steps. Each step is important, see
weighting.

Step 1 (10%): Choose a topic that is both personally interesting and relevant to your
life

Step 2 (40%): Create a plan for how you will learn about your topic
Monitor your learning process: Are you following the plan? How did you adapt or
change the plan?
Document your learning process (3 Mind-maps, Learning Record Form, Additional
Documents)

Step 3 (25%): Create a product which demonstrates what you have learned (It is
possible to combine this step with the step of Document your learning process. For
example, you might make a video which shows your progress of developing procedural
knowledge

Step 4 (25%): Reflection on the learning process, your successes, failures, and ways
to improve in the future.
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Step 1A - Before you begin: Do not move beyond this point until you have checked
off each part.
This project can be developed to help you learn either conceptual knowledge or
procedural knowledge.

Conceptual knowledge helps you to learn about something. It is more focused on

gathering information and answering questions. A driving question should be thoughtful
and open-ended, and analytical rather than descriptive. A sample driving question
might be Why did humans in different parts of the world develop different ethnic
features? or How will artificial intelligence shape the future of human life?

Procedural knowledge helps you to learn how to do something. There is a focus on

gathering information and answering questions, but the most important part is applying
the information to learn or develop a skill. You may want to teach yourself how to control
stress, play an instrument, or cook a certain type of cuisine. This type of project should
start with a goal statement. For example, I want to learn how to manage my social
anxiety more effectively or I want to develop my ability to create abstract art work.
 For students whose projects focus on procedural knowledge, you need to set a
SMART goal. SMART Goals are:

Specific and Significant Your goal is clear, and is something that is important to
you
Measureable This is something that you can measure and document as you
progress
Action-Oriented You are actually going to be doing, not just reading about it
Research Based Your actions are based on effective research on how to improve
Time Based You are clear about how long each step of the process will take
(continued on
next page)
Make a list of topics that interest you.
Do some informal learning. Read, watch videos, ask questions, talk to other students.
Have a discussion with the teacher.
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Step 1B: Choose a Topic - What do I want to learn?

Choose something that is interesting to you personally.

What is my driving question or SMART Goal?

What are some other things I need to learn?
Create your first mind-map that shows everything you know about this topic.
Fill out the first part of the learning record form.

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Step 2: Create a Learning Plan: How will I learn? How will I document my
learning?

Think about the outcomes of the quizzes on how you learn. What kind of strategies are
best for you?

As you learn, most of the important new information will be added to your learning
record form. This will be a large portion of your overall grade.

Since the learning process is the most important part of this project, it is weighted as
40% of your total grade. Therefore, having a plan but also documenting what you do
each day is essential. Create an organizer which shows your goal for each day, as
well as what you actually did.
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Step 3: Choose a Product: How will I demonstrate what I learned?

What kind of product do you want to create?

Notice that the product is 25% of the grade. While creating a high quality product is
important, it is less important than the process of learning itself. Do not forget this
point.

Criteria for conceptual knowledge

 o The product must clearly answer your driving question.
o The product must be able to present itself (without you there to explain it).

Criteria for procedural knowledge

o The product must be aligned with your SMART Goal
o The product must be able to present itself (without you there to explain it).
o For a procedural knowledge product, the product must show your growth over
time in the skill that you have chosen to develop. Therefore, it is highly
recommended that you collect visual (pictures), auditory (recordings), written,
and / or audio-visual (video) evidence of your progress.
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Step 4: Reflection: How will I reflect on my learning? What were my successes?
What were my failures? What can I learn from my mistakes? What could I do
different next time? What did I learn about myself as a learner?

Reflection is one of the most important parts, not only of learning, but of developing as
a human being. Reflection allows us to identify our strengths and weaknesses, and
develop plans to grow. As you can see here, the reflection grade (25%), is worth as
much as the product itself. This is because the ability to reflect is at least as important
as the ability to create a high quality product.

The reflection should be a minimum of 3 paragraphs. Before you begin, you should
think about and answer each of the following questions:

o What were my successes?

o What were my failures?
o What can I learn from my mistakes?
o What are my strengths as a learner?
o What are my weaknesses (areas for growth) as a learner?
o What could I do differently next time?
o What did I learn about myself as a learner?
o What did I learn about myself as a person?

As a school, MUIDS has a set of expected learner outcomes (ESLOs). This mission of
the school is to help you to achieve these outcomes. Look at the Schools ESLOs and
decide: which of these characteristics do you demonstrate in completing this project?
Add this to your reflection.

If you complete this reflection because you feel like you have to, it will have no benefit
to you. If you complete it because you understand it is a valuable part of the learning
process, and because you want to grow and develop as a person, it will be of great
value to your life.

Remember, you, me and everyone else are developing people. We have the ability to
grow in ways we cant even imagine yet. Learning new things will help your mind to
grow, but learning how to learn will make your possibilities for growth become
endless.